Thursday, May 19, 2011

Do the West & the Arabs Have the Right to Set Up a State to Be Called "palestine"?

The people of Israel, later called Jews, have lived in and been connected to the Land of Israel for about 3450 years since the going out from Egypt. From the time of Alexander of Macedon [died 323 CE] till Roman Emperor Hadrian, Greeks and Romans called the country Judea, that is, the Jewish land, the land of the Jews. The name is also spelled Judaea and IVDAEA in Latin. The name is confirmed in the Greek and Latin writings of that long period. It was not a land inhabited by Arabs, although there were some there and in the vicinity, no doubt. It was Hadrian who changed the country's name to Syria Palaestina [in 135 CE]. This was an act of hostility to the Jews who had rebelled against the Empire three times. Changing the name was meant as a punishment for the Jews and a way of obliterating the Jewish identity of their country. The Jews also suffered in that many were sold as slaves and otherwise driven off their lands, although Jews remained the predominant population in the country. Today, in a way not far different from Hadrian's, world empires use the name "palestine" in order to deny the Jews rights in their own homeland. The empires and much or most of the West, as well as the Arab and Muslim world, demand that Israel, the national state of the Jews, allow establishment of an Arab state to be called "palestine" in the heart of the ancient Jewish homeland. They follow in the footsteps of Emperor Hadrian.

Yet there never was a "palestinian people" in all history. Such a people is a modern invention of psychological/cognitive warfare, probably by British psywar experts. The notion that Israel was fighting not Arabs but a "palestinian people" came to world attention in 1964 with foundation of the Palestine Liberation Organization. At that time, the PLO declared to the king of Jordan, Hussein, that the land that they wanted for a state was NOT any land under his rule, not the "West Bank" of Jordan, but the part of the ancient Land of Israel under Jewish control, that is, the State of Israel within its 1949 armistice lines, since Israel had no land borders at that time. But if we examine this newly minted people, "the palestinians," we may ask how they differ in essential ways from the Arabs east of the Jordan? Or from the Arabs in Syria? Do they speak a different language? The PLO's declaration of a state of Palestine in November 1988 in Algiers expressed loyalty to the general Arab culture and cultural legacy. Indeed, the PLO has long been a member of the Arab League, another Arab state waiting to take power, as it were.

Today, now that Israel won in 1967 --in the face of Arab genocidal threats-- the lands of Judea-Samaria, formerly under Jordanian rule, and now that the PLO collaborates diplomatically with major world powers supposedly with the aim of setting up an Arab state in Judea-Samaria to be called "palestine," the Powers, the UN, the EU, and just about everybody overlook the basic refusal of the PLO/PA to make peace with Israel in any boundaries. Abu Mazen published an op ed [ghost written] in the NYTimes the other day in which he said that if the UN would recognize a PLO/PA state, the PLO/PA would use this status to prosecute Israel, to delegitimize Israel in world legal forums, such as the World Court at the Hague, the Int'l Criminal Court, the misnamed UN "Human Rights Council," etc. So no peace can come out of concessions made to the PLO/PA or out of negotiations with the PLO/PA. Actually, Abu Mazen has refused to negotiate with Israel for more than 2 1/2 years, since September 2008 when olmert was still prime minister. Further, the PLO/PA has made a pact with the Hamas for a joint govt of the territories already ceded by Israel to the racist, anti-Jewish PLO/PA. And the Hamas is brutally frank in its aim of genocide against the Jews. This aim appears in Article 7 of the Hamas charter. Obviously, Israel should not negotiate with a Nazi-like body such as Hamas. Hitler, to be sure, was never as frank in his genocidal purposes as the Hamas now is. But Obama may demand in today's speech that Israel negotiate with the Hamas Nazis nevertheless. He is part of the problem today.

Now let us return to the Jews' ties to the Land of Israel. Jews were a substantial part of Israel's population until the Crusader conquest. Between the conquest of Jerusalem in 1099 and 1112 or 1113, a dozen years later, the Crusaders massacred the bulk of the Jews in the country [according to historian Moshe Gil & others]. The Jews were ground down between two millstones, Islam and militant Christendom. Even after the Crusader massacres had subsided, the Jews were still a noticeable part of the population. After the Crusades, of course, the Jews returned to their pre-Crusades status of subjects of the Islamic state, dhimmis. And the Mamluk Empire, succeeding the Crusaders probably treated the worse Jews than they had been treated before, if that were possible. The flow of Jews to the Diaspora continued. Those who want to deny that Jews in the Dispersion were of Judaic descent, should bear in mind that the pagan Roman Empire had begun to forbid conversion of non-Jews to Judaism and this prohibition was made more severe under the subsequent Christianized empire. The prohibition served to preserve the original Jewish stock over the centuries. The genetic ties between Jews in the Diaspora from Minsk to Marrakesh and from Berlin to Baghdad have been confirmed by modern DNA studies, which even show a genetic affinity to some of the Arabs and other Mediterranean peoples, albeit there is not much affinity in cultural or moral terms between Jews and Arabs.

In recognition of --among other things-- the preservation of Jewish ethnicity since Roman times, the international community at the San Remo Conference [1920] and in the League of Nations [1922] recognized the Land of Israel --which they unfortunately called "palestine"-- as the Jewish National Home. Britain accepted the League's mandate to foster development of the National Home, including fostering "close settlement" of Jews on the land [Article 6 of the Mandate]. Needless to say, Britain betrayed its commitment to the Mandate, and in fact prevented Jews from finding refuge in the Jewish National Home when the Jews most needed a home, that is, during the Holocaust. Today, the National Home as a legal entity binding on the international community is largely forgotten, certainly at the UN, and by Britain in particular. This teaches us that Jews cannot trust Britain or the international community in general. Unfortunately, the United States is now following the anti-Jewish, anti-Israel path earlier trod by the United Kingdom. The Powers cannot be considered morally competent to judge Israel or to determine its future. The Jews cannot rely on the promises of the Powers.

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The world swims in lies. Who doesn't know that? Even the dupes are told there are lies about. We aim to dispel the fog of lies, especially about Israel, like our prophets of old and our poets like Yehudah haLevi.
We feature historic sources, documents, excerpts from the classics, etc.
How shall I render my vows and my bonds, While yet
Zion lieth beneath the fetter of Edom, and I in Arab chains?
The false prophets cry Peace, and there is no peace.
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About Me

צלום דבורה בת יהודה לייב ז''ל
Dvoyreh bas Yehudah Leyb, Eliyahu's mother. My own photo will have to await more peaceful times.
I have been an observer of
the human comedy, and the human tragedy for many years.